


you've got mail

by nightquills



Series: the world goes on [4]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Bad Flirting, Can be read as stand-alone, Drabble Collection, Established Relationship, Fluff, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Post-Canon, Texting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-17
Updated: 2020-04-15
Packaged: 2020-09-06 04:01:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 2,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20285059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightquills/pseuds/nightquills
Summary: The year after Andrew graduates, he and Neil probably spend a little too much on postage and stamps.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll just preface this by saying that this does have a base in canon—Andrew likes buying souvenirs for Bee, and I'm sure he could be persuaded to extend that habit to Neil too :)

It starts the second week of Neil’s senior year. He’s at the grocery store and he sees Andrew’s favorite kind of jelly beans on sale, and he doesn’t think twice before he’s putting a few bags in his basket. 

It’s not until Neil is on his way back to Fox Tower that he remembers that Andrew isn’t there to eat them. Neil briefly considers giving them to one of the sophomore girls on the team that always brings jelly bean vodka to parties, but he discards that idea. He bought the jelly beans for Andrew, so he’s going to give them to Andrew. 

The postage for the box ends up costing him more than the jelly beans themselves did, but that’s fine. Anyways, there’s a certain sense of satisfaction garnered from using blood money on something as innocuous as sending his boyfriend candy. 

Neil hands the box across the counter to the worker at USPS, and he’s practically forgotten about it by the time he gets out of evening practice. 

He’s reminded a few days later when his phone pings with a message from Andrew; Neil opens the text to see a picture of his box staring back at him, his messy handwriting visible on the address label. 

Andrew has only sent the picture, but the question after it is implied. 

**Neil: **nothing bad, promise  
  


A minute later, he gets an answer.

**Andrew: ** i am sure the team nutritionist would not appreciate your attempts at ruining my diet.   
  


Neil rolls his eyes, but smiles.

**Neil: **the diet would be ruined with or without me  
  
**Neil: **how many pints of ice cream do you have in the freezer right now?  
  


Andrew’s response takes a while to come, but when it does it reads only one thing.

**Andrew: **187%.  
  
**Neil: **<3  
  



	2. Chapter 2

Neil doesn’t think anything of it when he gets an email from the residential service desk a few weeks later about a package—he figures it’s probably the protein powder Kevin said he would be sending as part of his newest crusade to get Neil to bulk up. 

When he goes to pick up the package, however, he is given a box too small to hold any such thing. He examines the label, and is greeted by the sight of Andrew’s slanted scrawl. 

The sight brings a grin to Neil’s face, and he eagerly makes his way back to his room so that he can open it. Cutting open the tape reveals… a pair of socks? Then Neil realizes that they say Seattle on them—Seattle, where Andrew played an away game last week. 

He puts the socks on and sends a picture to Andrew. 

**Neil: **thanks for thinking of me  
  
**Andrew: **i wasn’t thinking of you, i was thinking of myself.  
  
**Andrew: **next time i visit, i don’t want your icicle feet touching me.  


Neil can at least concede that the socks are, indeed, very warm—but he still prefers Andrew's body heat instead. 


	3. Chapter 3

At a Friday night home game a little while later, Neil sees that they’re giving out free t-shirts to the crowd. He manages to snag one during half-time just before they run out, and the next day he goes to drop it off in the mail. 

Neil doesn’t get any text from Andrew confirming that he got it, but Neil figures it was probably delivered just fine. After all, Andrew isn’t exactly the most verbose of individuals. He tells himself that he’ll ask next week when he visits for the long weekend, and lets it slip from his mind. 

And it doesn’t come soon enough, but eventually Neil does make it home to Andrew. In the midst of the general relief and happiness Neil feels at that fact, however, he completely forgets to ask Andrew if he ever got Neil’s latest package. 

He does get an answer, however, when he goes to do the laundry so that he can pack his carry-on for the flight back to South Carolina. Neil has just started to pile clothes into the washing machine when a flash of orange catches his attention. He pulls on it, and there the shirt is—black, with an orange outline of a fox and exy racquet on the front and PALMETTO stamped across the back. 

The thought of Andrew using the shirt, even if it's just for sleep or working out, brings a smile to Neil’s face. He hopes Andrew thinks of him when he wears it. 


	4. Chapter 4

Every time Neil enters Fox Tower, he has to pass the row of mailboxes to get to the stairs. It’s become a habit for him to look at the one with his name on it as he passes by—not because he’s truly expecting to have any mail, but rather because it’s another reminder that he’s a real person now. Neil Josten is real. He’s able to put down ties, stay in one place, and he doesn’t have to run anymore. That remains a novel feeling that he still savors when he can. 

Neil’s on his way upstairs after getting back from class when he goes to give his box a tap only to realize that there’s actually something in it for once. He takes a moment to twist the little dials above the box to the assigned combination—the mechanisms are old and definitely worse for wear, so it takes a little force to get the damned thing to open—and then he’s holding a postcard in his hands. 

He pulled it out image side down, so he’s greeted with Andrew’s name on the return address and a conspicuously blank space where the message is meant to be. 

He flips the postcard over, and can’t help but let out a snort. The picture is of the duck statues in Boston’s Public Garden, and Andrew has written in sharpie over each of the ducks. The mother duck has Neil’s jersey number on it, and each of the proceeding ducklings is marked with the number of one of the younger foxes. 

Neil pulls out his phone and pulls up the text window with Andrew's name on it.

**Neil: **so are you saying that i’m no longer a fox, i’m a duck?  
  
**Andrew: **with the way you fret over the freshmen, i saw a real resemblance.  
  


A minute passes, and another text comes through.

**Andrew: **and you certainly make enough noise for one.  
  
**Neil: **you like when i’m noisy  
  
**Neil: **like the night before you flew out from columbia, remember?  
  
**Andrew: **that was a temporary lapse in judgement. you have a way of inspiring those.  
  
**Neil: **you mean to say you find me inspiring?   
  
**Andrew: **no, first and foremost i find you annoying.  
  


Neil laughs, and carefully pins the postcard to the front of his and Robin's fridge when he gets upstairs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The statues are based on the children's book "Make Way for Ducklings," which was one of my favorites when I was little! If you're ever in Boston, I would definitely recommend stopping by to see them :)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here, have a Halloween chapter almost a month after actual Halloween has passed. I wish I could say that that's not representative of my general time management skills hahaha

Neil has made the decision that he’s not going to dress up for Halloween this year. Neither Nicky nor Matt are here to plead with him about how fun it would be to get a costume, and neither Andrew nor Allison are here to strong-arm him into going shopping for one.

He’s still going to go to the team party in the basement of Fox Tower—he knows that as captain, it’s important for him to make himself visible and involved with the team even outside of practice—but he’s thinking that he’ll just dig his spare jersey out of his laundry bin and claim that he’s a student athlete if anyone asks. 

Then, of course, he gets the notification that there’s a package waiting for him. 

When he opens the box, the first thing he sees is a piece of paper folded around something. When he unfolds it, Neil is greeted by the sight of a set of fake teeth with exaggeratedly long canines. A single line of Andrew’s script on the paper reads “For your neck fetish.” 

Neil texts Andrew a picture of him baring his new fangs. 

**Neil: **haha, very funny  
  
**Andrew: **now all you need is the cape.  
  
**Neil: **andrew, tell me you didn’t actually get me a cape  
  
**Andrew: **were you paying any attention when nicky made us do that disney marathon? no capes.  
  


A moment, and then another text comes through. 

**Andrew: **i did get you a vest, though. unpack the rest of the box and try everything on.  
  
**Neil: **i already know it’s going to fit—the clothes you buy me always fit   
  


And it’s true; Andrew has an amazing ability to pick out clothes for Neil and have them fit perfectly. (Or at least, perfectly fit in Andrew’s eyes. Neil still thinks that they’re a little too tight, but everyone always tells him that that’s just because he grew up wearing clothes meant for someone two times bigger than he is.)

**Andrew: **do i have to spell it out? i want to see how it looks on you.  
  


That makes Neil’s cheeks heat and his pulse quicken. 

**Neil: **i’ll be sure to take plenty of pictures, then ;)  
  
**Andrew: **i would find that a lot more convincingly sexy if you were any good at taking selfies, neil. but we both know that’s not the case.  
  
**Neil: **i can give it my best shot. practice makes perfect, after all   
  
**Andrew: **said like a true athlete.  
  


Neil can just imagine Andrew’s put-upon sigh. 

**Andrew: **give it your best shot then, junkie.  
  


Neil proceeds to do just that.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was posted on 4/14/2020, but has been moved to reflect the chronology of the story :)

Neil agonizes a little bit over what to do for Andrew for his birthday. Ideally he’d like to go up and see him, but Andrew’s birthday is in the middle of the week and Neil can’t afford to take the time off. Failing that, Neil wants to give Andrew special—something that hits the perfect blend between sentiment and practicality, something that’ll show Andrew how much he means to Neil even though Neil can’t put his feelings into words that’ll do them justice. (And even if he could name them, he has a feeling that such a blatant verbal expression would be a little overwhelming for the both of them.)

Neil can recognize that he’s definitely overthinking this, and that Andrew probably has such low standards for birthdays, like Neil himself, that he isn’t expecting anything. That only makes Neil want to find the perfect gift even more. 

After weeks of searching, Neil thinks that he’s maybe found something. The idea comes to him one day when he’s doodling instead of taking notes in lecture, and it’s easy enough to recruit the help of one of the new freshmen—a graphic design major—to make it possible. 

Neil has the package delivered to himself instead of Andrew so that he can make sure it’s right. He opens the box, then the little box inside that one, and then he’s holding the customized Zippo in his palm.

It’s heavy—certainly nicer than the gas station lighters that Andrew buys and similarly discards with little care.

Neil traces a finger over the engraved AJM on the top half of the lighter, then the design that he drew where it spans the bottom half. 

It’s simple: a sun rising over the horizon line of a skull. Sunrise, death. Truths. He thought that writing his own name would be a little heavy-handed, even for his standards, but he hope that it still conveys his message. 

He tests the lighting mechanism, and, satisfied, tucks it back in the original box. From there it’s simple enough to drive to the post office and stand in line to ship it out. 

**Neil: **your birthday present is in the mail  
  
**Andrew: **birthday present.  
  
**Neil: **yes, that is what i said   
  
**Neil: **i know the curiosity can be hard to resist, but do try to wait for your birthday if it gets there early  
  
**Andrew: **i guess i can have a little restraint, as a treat.  
  
**Neil: **i know that meme!!!  
  
**Andrew: **and i am so proud of you, neil.  
  
**Neil: **always glad to hear it <3   
  
**Andrew: **if only i believed in god, i could ask him to give me the strength to deal with you.  
  
**Neil: **babe you say the sweetest things   
  


The morning of November 4th, Neil sends off a “happy birthday” as he leaves for his morning jog. He gets a response while he’s in his Complex Algebra class. Since the professor is notoriously terrible at noticing when students are on their phones, so Neil figures he can chance it and respond. 

**Andrew: **can i open my gift yet?  
  
**Neil: **only since you asked so nicely  
  


Neil tells himself that he shouldn’t be worried, but he can’t help the nervous butterflies in his stomach.

**Andrew: **i think the design is missing something.   
  
**Neil: **well, i figured that you’d remember who gave it to you  
  
**Andrew: **you know i can’t forget.   
  
**Andrew: **but i suppose that even if i did, we both know that truth has a way of coming back to you.   
  


Neil smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Neil's design for the lighter](https://nightquills.tumblr.com/post/615434672890068992/heres-a-little-visual-i-drew-for-the-latest)
> 
> Hello everyone! I hope that y'all are staying safe and holding up alright with everything that's going on right now.
> 
> I'd just like to take this opportunity to make a shout out on behalf of USPS, since their hard work enabled the idea behind this fic. If you're in the United States, I'd really appreciate if you could take a moment and text "USPS" to 504-09 to tell your representatives to support our postal system in their time of need.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! If you're opening this fic from your subscription email, please note that the new update is actually in the chapter before this one to reflect that it happens before Thanksgiving!

Though Neil has the week of Thanksgiving off, Andrew is not so lucky. Neil drops Andrew off at his mandatory practices and picks him up after so that he can use the car. 

It’s during that time that Neil goes grocery shopping. Feeding two athletes—even an athlete with admittedly abysmal eating habits like Andrew—is not an easy task, and it feels like the fridge has a bad habit of miraculously emptying overnight. 

The grocery store’s parking lot is packed today, which means that Neil ends up having to park a few shops down from Stop and Shop. He’s idly looking at the storefronts as he passes them by when one catches his eye. He thinks it over only for a moment before entering. 

When Neil makes it back to Andrew’s apartment with the groceries, he stops at the doorman’s desk. It takes a little explaining, but soon he’s passing a box over with an assurance that the doorman will pass it on to Andrew when he gets back from dropping Neil at the airport in a few days. 

Sure enough, Neil has just made it through airport security—which, given that it’s the weekend after Thanksgiving and the entire world is trying to make it back in time for Monday, is an absolute zoo—when he gets a text from Andrew. 

**Andrew: **what exactly am i supposed to do with these?  
  
**Neil: **i thought that was rather self explanatory. you put them by the window and water them every once in a while  
  


When he receives no response, Neil sends off another text.

**Neil: **the one in the dark grey pot made me think of you. small, blond, a little rough around the edges…  
  
**Andrew: **fuck you, neil.   
  
**Neil: **you lost your chance at that for a while, huh? you’ll have to wait until winter break  
  
**Andrew: **you are insufferable, and i am letting these plants die out of spite.   
  


For all of Andrew’s threats, the cacti are healthy when Neil does make it back to his apartment a month later. When Andrew notices him staring at them one day, he comments that “They’re almost as hard to kill as you are.”

Neil turns towards him and reaches out, and Andrew steps closer into the circle of his arms. “What can I say?” Neil says into Andrew’s ear. “You’re not getting rid of us that easily.”

Andrew’s arms wrap themselves around Neil’s back, and Neil feels the puff of Andrew’s exhaled breath against his neck. “Apparently,” he responds. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was thinking that the cacti Neil compares Andrew to is the smallest, roundest little golden barrel cactus. Of course, with spikes that could kill a man.  
Also holy hell, it's finally break!!! (Which, as much as I hate the history of Thanksgiving, is very much fucking needed at this point in the semester.)

**Author's Note:**

> As always, please feel free to come and talk to me on [tumblr](http://nightquills.tumblr.com/) or [twitter](https://twitter.com/nightquills) if you'd like :)


End file.
